Doing
my little research sweep before starting this review, I was
very surprised to find how few versions there are of Beethoven’s
Piano Concertos performed on fortepiano. Robert Levin has
recorded a complete set with Sir John Eliot Gardiner on Archiv
using one of Paul McNulty’s excellent instruments, the same
maker whose expressive tones have helped make Ronald Brautigam’s
recordings for the BIS label so special. This would seem
to be a top choice at full price if you can still find it,
but the re-release of Roger Norrington and Melvyn Tan’s cycle
on Virgin’s budget Veritas label provides a valuable introduction
to the world of Beethoven on authentic instruments.

What
is indeed significant about these recordings is both Norrington’s
interpretation, and the use of a fortepiano instead of the
pianoforte employed in most modern performances and recordings.
The wood-framed instrument used here has thinner strings
held at lower tension that with a metal-framed modern grand
piano, the volume of sound and absolute dynamic and keyboard
range being a good deal reduced in comparison. The argument
against such projects often states that ‘if Beethoven were
alive today he would have used the much improved modern piano’,
and if you are used to these pieces played on a modern grand
the first impressions with this strange sounding fortepiano
in this recording would seem to bear this out. The point
is undoubtedly true, if founded on an impossibility, but
the main issue is an attempt to find out what all the fuss
was about in the first place. Audiences confronted with Beethoven
would have been more used to the more galant style
of composers like Haydn or Mozart, and having a conductor
like Norrington recreate the seating plan for the orchestra
is as it would have been in Beethoven’s day and using instruments
contemporary to the time, gives us a closer idea of what
they might have encountered than with an all-modern performance.

Jos
van Immerseel, who has also recorded the five concertos on
fortepiano with Bruno Weil and Tafelmuziek on the Vivarte
label, asks the question, “How can we know which grand piano
inspired Beethoven?” In the large number of his letters preserved
for posterity Beethoven writes about pianofortes, usually
describing them with satisfaction and even enthusiasm.

The
names of instrument builders which frequently appear are
those of Walter and Streicher, and it is a copy by Derek
Adlam of one of Nannette Streicher’s instruments used by
Melvyn Tan in these recordings, so we can be sure the sound
is one which Beethoven would have recognised. Immerseel also
makes the point that Beethoven’s writing never pushes these
instruments beyond what would have been possible at the time,
so the idea of the composer raging against the limitations
of the instruments at his disposal is something of a myth – for
sure, he extended the techniques of playing beyond most musicians
in some of his sonatas, but that’s another issue entirely.
The instrument’s leather-clad hammers provide a different
kind of clarity which incidentally would later be re-discovered
by Conlon Nancarrow for the intense complexities of some
of his player-piano music, so there’s some retro-historical
interest to be had as well. Once you have become used to
the different sonorities of the fortepiano, you soon come
to value the warmth and intimate expressiveness which it
can create under the right fingers, and specialist Melvyn
Tan amply proves the case for resurrecting these instruments
in this repertoire through these recordings.

Having
accepted the value of original instruments and historically
informed performance, one can relax and enjoy the music.
These recordings were well received when they first came
out in the late 1980s, and while historically informed performance
practise is a constantly evolving art the standard here is
one by which others can still be judged. One of the most
fascinating aspects is hearing how Beethoven’s own cadenzas
developed and changed through the course of these works,
and while Tan’s touch can be quite magical at any moment,
it is when the orchestra is silent that you can appreciate
it the most. The solo opening of the Largo second
movement of the Piano Concerto No.3 is a case in point,
where the pedalling shows how the chords can be built in
stages without creating an the unwieldy wash of sound an
undamped modern grand creates. Tan’s agility and effortless
technical accuracy is constantly in evidence, and one can
easily imagine the breathtaking response these pieces would
have drawn from contemporary crowds. The fortepiano brings
out some remarkable effects. The introduction to the cadenza
in the first movement of the Piano Concerto No.4 is
one such, and the low register of the instrument has an other-worldly
character of its own which Beethoven often allows to provide
moments of most intense drama.

The
orchestra, while indeed using authentic instruments, nevertheless
sounds not entirely dissimilar to a modern orchestra. The
string sound is full and generous, despite what sounds like
a fairly strictly applied non-vibrato basis, something which
Norrington has since pursued with somewhat idealistic zeal.
The results of this have more recently made him controversial
in some circles. At this stage the winds are allowed a certain
amount of license in this direction however, and the solos
sound natural and unmannered. Fans of Norrington’s pioneering
1980s Beethoven Symphony cycle with the London Classical
Players on EMI – now also on Virgin – will know what to expect
in this regard. The refreshingly different colour and sonorities
with this orchestra should not be underestimated, and if
you only know these concertos with modern instruments you
will find yourself discovering them anew, like revisiting
a familiar interior which has had all the peachy plush tasteful
trimmings taken down to reveal rich wood panelling and some
perfectly preserved late 18th century tapestries.

This
set of the Beethoven Piano Concertos has appeared in a number
of guises in the past, as an earlier Virgin Veritas edition
in 1996, and as one of the Virgin ‘4 Pleasure’ four disc
sets in 2003 which also included the Choral Fantasy and some
solo works. It is a very good thing that these concerto recordings
are maintained in the catalogue with this new re-release.
Not long before these recordings would have been released
for the first time I remember a client in the great Farringdons
record shop asking for something ‘on black vinyl’ rather
than those newfangled CeeDee things. These recordings are
worth every penny of their diminutive asking price, and I
heartily recommend them to anyone looking for an alternative
to these works other than ‘on big black concert grand piano’.

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